Waiting for Emily

We spent Sunday morning in Hong Kong and then traveled to Guangzhou by train in the afternoon. Since we aren't quite over our jet lag yet (we are usually awake for the day by 3:30 am) we actually spent a lot of time out and about in Hong Kong before we left. We went to a famous Dim Sum restaurant called Luk Yu very early in the morning. We were their first customers of the day! We took the Hong Kong subway to Dim Sum and we were very proud that we navigated our way around successfully in the early morning dark. The food was delicious, but we weren't entirely sure what we were eating. The only thing I recognized for sure were the steamed pork buns. None of the servers spoke any English. They walked around the restaurant carrying trays and singing about the food on their trays. They stop at your table and show you what they have. We pointed at what we wanted to try and they served it to us. The restaurant is a real 1930s style tea house complete with lots dark wood and spittoons next to every table. The restaurant has so many "regular" customers that most of the tables are usually reserved.

After Dim Sum, we went shopping in the area around our hotel and then took the 2 hour train ride to Guangzhou. We passed through many cities complete with hundreds of fairly new high rise apartment buildings. It reminded us of a speech we attended last fall during which Tony Blair noted that the industrialization of China is causing millions of Chinese to move from their rural farms to the cities to work in factories. Most of the apartment buildings we passed were less than 10 years old. We also passed some subsistence farms and noted the very difficult living arrangements for the farmers. The farmers we saw live in small cinderblock homes (about 20 feet square) located right in the middle of their 1/2 acre plot of farm land.

We checked into the White Swan Hotel in Guangzhou after we arrived. This hotel is quite near the US Consulate and, as a result, nearly every American family who adopts from China stays here. It is located on Shamian Island in the Pearl River, an area that was settled by the French in the 19th Century. As a result, the architecture is an interesting combination of European and Chinese. It's really quite lovely.

We got a nice surprise shortly after we arrived. Emily's orphanage sent us some updated photos and information about her. She definitely looks a little bigger and has some more hair. We are scheduled to meet her in person in just a little over an hour! There are six families who are adopting children from her orphanage, the Suixi County Social Welfare Institute, today. Our guide told us it takes about 8 hours to drive from her orphanage to Guangzhou. I am sure that most of these babies are going to be exhausted by the time they meet their parents. I have a feeling we will all be in for a long night...

We will post some photos of our Gotcha Day experience either later tonight or tomorrow.